Altium
See what's coming in Altium Designer Release 10
Flash version 9,115 or greater is required
Click here to download the latest version
Smart data management
We've helped hundreds of companies improve productivity (some by up to 400%), take control of their design data, and get projects manufactured as designed first time.
With Altium Designer Release 10 on the way, see how Altium Designer couples high-integrity data management with design freedom and how this changes the design game for our customers.
In this webinar, we'll show you the secret of achieving robust data management without losing design freedom. And we'll preview some of the key data management concepts coming in Altium Designer Release 10 that make this new release a game changer in terms of taking your design safely, securely and speedily from design to manufacture and production
Join a free live webinar
We'll show you how to generate releases from designs using the pre-configured design and release vaults, set up configurations with validation and production output jobs and much more, all in about 20 mins.
This webinar centers around the Release Vault or the place in which the data, produced through the high integrity release process flow discussed in earlier webinars, is destined - with an emphasis on just what a Release Vault is and how the lifecycle of release data is managed and how we then collaborate with production partners.
Board Implementation Highlights
Ever wondered how live interactive team-based PCB design could dramatically improve your design output? Wonder no more - Release 10 of Altium Designer includes a version control based real-time collaboration environment for PCB layout. Watch this video to find out how it works, and you'll be amazed how easy it is!
Altium Designer's interactive PCB routing capabilities have had significant advancements in the past few years. This video highlights some of these capabilities that show "high-end" routing definitely has come to the affordable "mainstream". Check it out and be amazed!
Features coming in Altium Designer Release 10...
Output Job Files have been around for a while, but with all the new capabilities they have in Release 10, we needed to make a few important tweaks to the Output Job Editor. We think it's not only much easier to use, but also that it makes using other new features like Publishing Destinations and release-managed variants way more intuitive. We think you'll agree too - take a look and see!
Anyone who has used Altium Designer for more than a month knows - the preferences within the software allow you to tailor your user experience to fit just right. So what happens when you need to work on a different computer? Now, Altium Designer Release 10 can store your preferences in the cloud, and automatically retrieve them when you open the software - wherever you may happen to be.
To aid you in writing safe, quality C code, Altium Designer includes the ability to perform post-compilation static code analysis, testing against rules and/or recommendations provided by the CERT C Programming Language Secure Coding Standard.
Release 10 Embedded Project Options now have the option to control the placement of objects with detail, and also object copying. You can even use RAM copy to easily speed up the iterative download-debug-code process when working with FLASH memory.
There’s no question that workstation operating systems march on continuously, and with Windows 7 64-bit rapidly becoming the standard OS for engineering desktops, Altium Designer Release 10 has been built to fully support the Windows 7 environment.
The Software Platform Builder now has the ability to generate the Software Platform Wrapper - C code and header files that initialize global handles for devices on the wishbone bus within the embedded hardware. It can also automate global driver initialization.
A new command is provided in Devices View for launching new debug sessions from soft designs that are already running at full speed, without resetting the target CPU. This allows you to launch debug sessions over JTAG even with embedded systems running in-situ.
Release 10 is not just about loads of additional features, but a lot of refactoring has been done on Release 10 code for improved performance and memory management. One such improvement is the re-drawing of planes after plane splits have been placed or moved. This real-time video shows the contrast for complex boards.
As if the Nanoboard Interface and the ability to control the embedded digital IO instrument weren't enough, with Release 10 you can now access the Frequency Generator, Frequency Counter, Digital IO, Cross-Point Switch, Wishbone Probe, Memory Instrument and Terminal all directly through scripts.
The Polygon Pour Manager dialog delivers further productivity-enhancements in Release 10: creation of polygons from board outline or pre-existing polygons, the ability to batch-delete from the right-click menu, and easy access to polygon properties all from within the polygon manager make working with polys a snap.
The ability to have assembly variants, batch output jobs and design releases has been around for a while, but the new PCB Configuration Manager takes these concepts a leap forward, giving users a significant confidence boost that the board fabrication and assembly data they generate is correct, accurate and up to date.
Snap Grids have been the standard way of controlling the accuracy of the mouse cursor for decades, but they have limited usefulness for today's complex, dense designs. We took a step back to think about how the mouse cursor snap could be made a whole lot more powerful and intuitive. We think the result is amazingly cool, and we think you'll like it too. Take a peak!
With all the new Data Management features going into Altium Designer Release 10, plus the inclusion of Subversion binaries in the Altium Designer installation, the configuration of all data management and related functions has been collected in a coherent preferences category - no need to get lost in preferences looking for the Vault settings, Auto save options, installed libraries list or any other data management option.
Tired of being restricted by universal rectangular grids? Altium Designer Release 10 has a new grid manager that allows you to easily create, locate and prioritize any number of customized cartesian and polar grids. You can even rotate your cartesian grids to any angle, and have asymetric spacing. The level of control for object placement is second to none!
Embedded designs often require debugging with memory mapped peripherals, which can be a bit of a pain when your only access to those peripherals is via the flat memory map of the target processor. The new Peripherals Panel removes that headache - giving named and typed access to registers and flags within the wishbone peripherals embedded within your soft design.
Altium has partnered with Atmel to create support for the QTouch(R) and QMatrix(R) touch sensor interface technology directly into the Altium Designer component libraries. Parametrically driven models make implementing QTouch(R) and QMatrix(R) controls fast and simple.
Say goodbye to boring static presentations to clients or your boss. The PCB Editor in Release 10 has a 3D Movie Manager that lets you create stunning 3D animations (or, movies) of your PCB design. Ideal for demonstrating tricky assembly points.
Up until now you've had the ability to see and edit variants in the Altium Designer schematic editor. With Release 10, variant information is visible within the PCB editor as well. In addition, variants can be used to drive PCB fabrication outputs, making it possible to alter masks and silk screen based on the variant selected.
Release 10 features new Software Platform Stacks that enable 2G and 3G mobile network access via the PB15 2G/3G peripheral board for the NB2 and NB3000 NanoBoard platforms. This lets you easily add mobile comms to your soft system designs.
New Software Platform Stacks have been released that enable USB 2.0 based Wi-Fi connectivity facilitated by low cost USB dongles, as well as 2G and 3G mobile network access via the PB15 2G/3G peripheral board for the NB2 and NB3000 NanoBoard platforms.
Multi-track routing has been enhanced with arced 45 and 90 degree corner styles, just like single track and pair routing. In addition, loop removal is also done on multi-routed track groups. Interactive routing modes also have enhanced via pushing capability.
In prior versions of Altium Designer, classes for nets, components, pads, channels etc. were generated from the ECO process or manually, and resided in a flat non-structured form.
This release introduces the ability to create higher-level class structures from hierarchical schematic designs, allowing classes to contain subclasses in a similar hierarchy. The Class Manager dialog in PCB has been enhanced to facilitate class structure editing, and structured classes also appear in the PCB panel.
Altium has teamed up with Aldec to incorporate a built-in free OEM version of Aldec's ActiveHDL simulation engine. It operates seamlessly within the Altium Designer environment in place of the previous DXP simulator, providing better results and support for the simulation of Verilog and "Do" scripts.
If you need higher simulation speed and extra features, you can switch to the full licensed version of Aldec ActiveHDL, also supported by Altium Designer.
- Want to know more?
Get updated as we add more videos to this site. - Live Webinars Connect with Altium experts. Register now.
- We're here to helpWant to know more? Contact us with any queries.
- Follow us on TwitterKeep in touch with Altium via Twitter